miketoner
03-10-2006, 09:32 PM
For people who like eccentric-looking aircraft, the Locust has flown. It flew reasonably well. Turns out it had lots of response on the elevator because the tail is so long, but as expected the roll rate is pretty slow. So I flew arond for a bit then brought it around to land. Then after I landed, and not a bad landing at that, the gear spread out sideways, and the airplane did look like an insect with fat wings, skinney body, and legs sticking out. I bent the gear back. Anybody out there have any suggstions for heat-treating iron wire to make it stiff? The wire was salvaged from an old dead printer. It used to be the guide that was supposed to prevent the paper from getting fouled in the tractor feed. The other amusing thing is that after I walked over to the airplane to carry it back in, the propeller was missing, so it was actually a dead-stick landing. I guess that Hacker 2025-4200 must have torqued it right off. Took me about 10 minutes of hunting around to find the propeller off the south-west corner of the runway. Too bad about the prop nut. Oh well. :rolleyes: